Cardiovascular syphilitic infection
The incidence of late manifestations of syphilis have declined almost to a rare entity since the era of antibiotics. Before the discovery of penicillin, tertiary syphilis infection was the most common cause of thoracic aortic aneurysm, resulting in 5–10% of cardiovascular deaths.
The primary lesion of cardiovascular syphilis is aortitis, an inflammatory response to the invasion of the aortic wall by the Treponema pallidum that evolves to obliterative (...)